The former Afghan Prime Minister and leader of the Islamic Party, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, announced that he had survived an assassination attempt that took place near the party's office in Kabul, but the attack resulted in the death of one of his bodyguards, on a day that also witnessed an attack on the Pakistani embassy in the city.
The attack took place on the office of the Islamic Party today, Friday, near a mosque where senior leaders of the party were.
Hekmatyar said in a video speech after the accident, "I assure the Afghan people... I survived an assassination attempt, and those behind the attack tried before, but they did not succeed."
"The two attackers, dressed as camouflage women and wearing explosive belts, opened fire on those outside the mosque," he added.
D an Islamic party on the notebook of D Nnni e-mail په په کل ښاگلی ڪمیار څرگندونې.
pic.twitter.com/1YisNTYzLS
— Hamid |
Hamid (@hamid_JEA) December 2, 2022
Hekmatyar reported the death of one of his bodyguards and the wounding of two others, and said, "We will know later who is behind this attempt."
He stressed that what happened will not "weaken our morale or our resistance. We will stand with our nation."
Al-Jazeera correspondent had quoted a security source as saying that suicide bombers attacked a mosque belonging to the Islamic Party, south of the capital, Kabul.
Hekmatyar founded Hezb-e-Islami in the mid-1970s and was among the major mujahideen movements that resisted the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in the 1980s from its base in Pakistan.
Hekmatyar served as prime minister twice during the 1990s.
The incident came on the same day as the attack on the Pakistani embassy in Kabul, which was condemned by Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and said it was an assassination attempt on his country's chief of mission in Afghanistan.
For its part, the Afghan Foreign Ministry expressed its strong condemnation of the attack on the Pakistani embassy, and said that Afghanistan will not allow any party to compromise the security of diplomatic missions.